Olivera also emphasizes the uniqueness of the peoples' approach to this failure. The people have rallied around a positive, participatory vision. People know what they want. Part of what they want is founded in long standing indigenous traditions of localized resource management and decision making. Of Bolivia's 8.6 million inhabitants 60 per cent are indigenous people.
Barlow says Bolivia has been “particularly influential in creating a progressive climate in Latin America” where power is shifting away from the neoliberal camp. Similarly, Olivera sees Bolivia playing a key role in a shift much broader than one country.
“La gente”
As I listen to Olivera one phrase rises above the others — a phrase at the centre of that shift: “la gente.” Translated directly, it simply means “the people.” But punctuated with a history of struggle and the taste of an inevitably better future — as it is when Olivera says it — “la gente” carries meaning beyond its English rendering. There seems to be a davidian confidence spreading amongst the people, a modest momentum that is slowly shifting the locus of power away from national electoral politics. Getting the right guy in power is less and less important, as power increasingly lies elsewhere — a view also portrayed in Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein's The Take. This is not electoral reform, but a bottoms-up reclaiming of democracy.
Olivera distills the issues of globalization and democracy into a single question: “Who decides?” Increasingly in Bolivia, the common people — with their blemishes, hopes and montage of interests — are deciding.
“The people want to participate in the management of all that affects their daily lives,” says Olivera. “The people want to construct a new model.” And they appear to be doing just that. The people of Bolivia are on the move. The momentum of “la gente” is tipping the scales of Bolivian history in favour of the common people.
Water for the people, by the people
Olivera also emphasizes the uniqueness of the peoples' approach to this failure. The people have rallied around a positive, participatory vision. People know what they want. Part of what they want is founded in long standing indigenous traditions of localized resource management and decision making. Of Bolivia's 8.6 million inhabitants 60 per cent are indigenous people.
Barlow says Bolivia has been “particularly influential in creating a progressive climate in Latin America” where power is shifting away from the neoliberal camp. Similarly, Olivera sees Bolivia playing a key role in a shift much broader than one country.
“La gente”
As I listen to Olivera one phrase rises above the others — a phrase at the centre of that shift: “la gente.” Translated directly, it simply means “the people.” But punctuated with a history of struggle and the taste of an inevitably better future — as it is when Olivera says it — “la gente” carries meaning beyond its English rendering. There seems to be a davidian confidence spreading amongst the people, a modest momentum that is slowly shifting the locus of power away from national electoral politics. Getting the right guy in power is less and less important, as power increasingly lies elsewhere — a view also portrayed in Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein's The Take. This is not electoral reform, but a bottoms-up reclaiming of democracy.
Olivera distills the issues of globalization and democracy into a single question: “Who decides?” Increasingly in Bolivia, the common people — with their blemishes, hopes and montage of interests — are deciding.
“The people want to participate in the management of all that affects their daily lives,” says Olivera. “The people want to construct a new model.” And they appear to be doing just that. The people of Bolivia are on the move. The momentum of “la gente” is tipping the scales of Bolivian history in favour of the common people.
Water for the people, by the people
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